


Song

by AngelicSentinel



Series: i carry your heart [5]
Category: Magic Kaito, 名探偵コナン | Detective Conan | Case Closed
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations, Song Lyrics, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-14
Updated: 2017-07-14
Packaged: 2018-12-01 22:52:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11496423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngelicSentinel/pseuds/AngelicSentinel
Summary: the one where whenever you get a song stuck in your head, it’s because your soulmate is singing it.





	Song

**I.**

It starts the day Shiho administers the proto-formula to the lab rats. A song, playing on repeat in her head. It’s a sad sweet little pop song, and she’s taken a back, a little, at just how apt the song lyrics are. _’_ _The better I become at telling lies and excuses, the more I feel afraid in the emptiness._ _’_ She pauses for a moment, looking over at the stark white lab.

It feels like all she’s ever been, lies and excuses. At first she had been excited to pick up the work of her parents, but now she’s not so sure. Not with the way Gin leers at her, the way Vermouth always has a sneer directed her way. The way they’ve already been using her mistakes to kill people. She shakes her head. She _needs_ to do better. Her hand fists up involuntarily; without realizing it, she’s crushed one of her slides, and the glass cuts into her palm ’ _It’s always so simple I could cry, but I want to smile._ _’_ It’s a man’s voice, soft and crooning, singing a song she’s never heard before, and then the implication of it hits her hard.

She’s never given much of a thought to soulmates. She’d never thought she’d have one, they are so rare. A statistical anomaly.  But as the story goes, they come in bits and pieces, in songs you’ve never heard but somehow know the lyrics to. ’ _If I become stronger I’ll forget even your kindness, so I want to stay weak._ _’_

He sounds so sad, she thinks. Then she shakes her head and gets back to running another hypothetical simulation on the computer while she waits for the formula to confirm or deny her observations. It’s none of her business, she repeats to herself. She doesn’t have time for this. She has a job to do, and she doesn’t have time for distractions.

 _’_ _I want your love,_ _’_ the man sings to her, his voice perfect.

Two minutes later, she’s using a search engine to look up the song.  

**II.**

Shinichi’s on another case. It’s nothing unusual; ever since he solved the case on the plane, his father’s old friend Megure has been calling him for assistance more and more. It’s not as if he minds, but Ran had wanted him to go the movies with her (and to be honest, he had kind of wanted to go, too) but duty calls.

He’s at the apartment, casing the room for anything forensics might have missed, when the first words of a song drift through his head. ’ _It’s a tricky situation_ _. I’ve only got myself to blame.’_ He’s taking a step, and he stumbles, tripping over his slipper and falling to the floor, hitting his head on the edge of the sofa. ’ _It’s a simple fact of life, it can happen to anyone~’_

Shinichi wishes he’d shut up. “Hey! I’m trying to think, here,” he grouses from the floor. “Stop singing.”

Megure’s looking at him funny. “Are you alright, Shinichi-kun? No one is singing.”

“But–” He’s singing the song in English, with the faintest Japanese accent. _’_ _You win, you lose,_ _i_ _t’s a chance you have to take with love,_ _’_ If no one is singing, that means it’s in his head. And that means–

“Oh no,” Shinichi moans. That means it’s his soulmate. And if they’re male, it means it’s not Ran. But soulmates aren’t necessarily lovers. It just means they get you on a fundamental level, that the capacity for understanding is there. It can be platonic, familial. It’s a rare phenomenon, but they’ve even done studies, and even though romantic pairs make up about eighty percent, there’s still that twenty. That makes him breathe a little easier.

 _’_ _Oh yeah, I fell in love_ _b_ _ut now you say it’s over and I’m falling apart._ _’_

Yeah, they’re not the only ones falling apart. Shinichi’s still reeling, but he’s able to put a few clues together by the song: male, young and not fully grown by the timber of the voice, possibly even his age, from the Kanto region by the accent, bilingual or at the very least, good at mimicking foreign words.  

Well. What it is is a mystery. And Shinichi has always liked mysteries. It might take him a little effort to figure it out. It might even be fun. It could be worse, right?

That feeling changes when later in the week he hears another voice, this time female, as Ran is participating in her karate tournament. Ran is clearly not singing.

**III.**

Kaito is so done. So, so done. Okay, so he likes to sing. It’s good voice practice, perfect for warm-ups, especially if he’s trying to imitate someone.

But he did not ask for this.

So yeah, maybe he does like to sing all of the time. Maybe he sings a little too much if you ask his friends and classmates. But it’s not like he had any idea he had a soulmate! Much less two! He might have toned it down a little.

He tilts his head. Okay, maybe not, but still. This is too much! He’s sitting in class, and at first he thinks it is a prank by Aoko, but no. She’s not singing at all, there’s no hidden music player. The voice is not hers.

About three percent of the global population has soulmates, about 240 million. About a million of those people live in Japan. But he’s never heard of anyone having more than one soulmate, not before he looked it up. And even then, there have been less than ten recorded cases of two or more soulmates worldwide.

So why him? He slams his head on the desk and groans. There are two songs running through his head. And they clash so horribly. One is a female’s voice singing a children’s song. ’ _I stepped on a cat and it scratched me._ _’_

No. It’s catchy and it’s going to be stuck in his head forever, ugh. The second song sounds like pop, and very familiar like he’s probably heard it before, and the content of the lyrics…it’s almost like the man is singing it directly to him, to the melancholy he’s tried to hide ever since he literally took up his father’s mantle. And this voice sounds familiar too, like he’s heard it before. But it’s hard to tell, the way they’re singing on top of one another. _’_ _Even if it’s in broken speech, I want you to tell me your pain._ _’_ That’s…interesting. Kaito does sing a lot of love songs, but this is almost like permission to keep singing. Also, it’s very off-key, like the person singing it is tone deaf.

 _’_ _It scratched me, it scratched me, the cat was shocked and it scratched me.’_ The woman’s voice sounds positively vindictive, like she’s really enjoying singing it, almost as if it’s repayment for all the times he’s sung thoughtlessly.

 _’_ _Pretending that the pain’s worn off doesn’t make you an adult._ _’_ Kaito frowns. That hits a little too close to home.

 _‘What a bad cat!’_ Technically, that is probably referencing him too. She doesn’t sound too happy with him.

 _’_ _I want to protect that look in your eyes_ _’_

_Cut your claws!’_

_’_ _Believe in the love_ _that can change sadness to strength.’_

 _‘Get off the roof and_ _shave your whiskers._ _’_

Kaito groans louder.

**IV.**

It takes an embarrassingly long time for Shiho to figure it out, and even then, it’s all thanks to Tsuburaya-kun. It’s hard getting used to who she is now, and even though she’s enjoying her anonymity, her escape from the science that both chained her and freed her, some part of her misses who she was before.

She’s humming thoughtlessly, her thoughts on the next chemical equation she’s going to use for the antidote.

“Wow,” Tsuburaya says, “That’s really neat!”

“Huh?” Shiho says, lifting her head, pulled abruptly from her heavy mathematical thoughts. “What’s neat?”

“You and Conan-kun are humming the same song!”

Seeing as how it’s the same song her soulmate has been humming for three days, Shiho blanches and pulls Tsuburaya’s collar so that his face is even with hers. “We. Are. Not.”

“But you are!” the boy says, blushing at their close proximity, and sure enough, Kudou is a couple meters away, listening to Genta talk, humming the same song as she had just been. “Does that mean that you two are…” he holds out his thumb. “….soulmates?”

“No,” Shiho says. “We aren’t.”

“But–” he starts to protest, and Shiho pulls out her secret weapon.

“If you don’t say anything about this to anyone I will give you my super ultra rare _Masked Yaiba_ gold foil holographic card,” she pulls it out of her purse, holds it out to him. She’s been saving it for an emergency, and this qualifies as one.

Tsuburaya gasps. “There are only ten in existence,” he says, his voice radiating awe, whispering the words like a prayer.

He reaches out his hands, fingers twitching, but Shiho pulls it away. “Uh uh uh. Not one word,” she says. “You have to promise. Cross your heart and hope to **die** you won’t say anything,”

Tsuburaya gulps. “I promise! But let me have it? Please?” he begs.

“Prove that you can keep quiet, and I will.”

She looks ahead. Kudou has stopped humming, saying something to Kojima, but the song is still in her head, someone still humming it incessantly. Then it picks up again, as Kudou starts humming again, almost like it’s in stereophonic sound. She can pick out two voices now that’s she’s looking for it, but they sound so similar it’s easy to see how she could have been mistaken.

She’d thought it was weird how the genres were always shifting, how the songs would randomly switch sometimes, how one moment he could sing well and the next moment he sounded like a dying cat. Shiho can only come to one conclusion: she has two soulmates. Kudou is one.

Who is the other?

**V.**

It all comes to a head at the Kirin Heist. His male soulmate is apparently a Kid fan; there’s been a Kid theme song running through Shinichi’s head all night. ’ _Oooh KID. Run away with the treasure, night after night! What a cool boy_!’

Shinichi is about a hundred percent done. He’s trying to think, to anticipate what Kid’s going to do, but it’s hard when all he can hear is that stupid song. There’s some trick, something about the four treasures. But what is it?  He takes the building in again. He’s missing something.

Also, for some strange reason, Haibara is glaring at him. She’s been acting weird for some time now, but he hasn’t done anything recently to make her angry at him. He thinks.

Inspector Nakamori is muttering something under his breath as he makes his last minute checks, but Shinichi is too far away to hear what it is. ’ _Phantom thief me_ g _onna steal this beat, see?’_

Oh, please. It almost sounds like _Kid’s_ the one singing the song, but that couldn’t be it, right? He looks around the room again, this time looking at lips, trying to read them, but he doesn’t have a song in his head anymore.

Then the lights go out and he’s zapped by a taser, and he goes out like the lights.

He comes to as Haibara is singing to herself, trying to keep herself calm in the dark.  “ _I made so many mistakes, finding the way. I was running against something_ …”

“ _I was able to escape just a little bit from the memories,_ ” and it’s the same song that’s running through his head, a sweet little pop ballad he would say is completely uncharacteristic of Haibara. But she does keep a lot under the surface.

It could actually be worse, he muses, stunned. He and Haibara get each other, even though most of the time she likes to make fun of him. Not that he doesn’t give it back, mind.

She backs up, and he tugs at her leg, telling her to be quiet and giving her his deduction. Then he adds, singing in a soft voice just under his breath alongside her, “ _Blown about by the wind, that’s how I’m living now._ ”

Haibara’s eyes widen.

**VI.**

Kaito’s panting, darting through the trees, trying to get far enough away he can use his hang glider. This night suuuuuucks so hard. His soulmates are apparently two little brats, (why though) the police keep finding him out somehow even though he’s changed his face like twice, and he stubbed his toe so hard on a rock it’s bleeding.

He can tell the little demon-eyed girl is the cat lady. He had the _Flea Waltz_ in his head for _weeks_. When she sang that song in the dark, it finally all came together, how it echoed in his head. That was bad enough.

No, what was downright shocking was how it became a duet right before his eyes, her sweet voice joined by an off-key bugle and echoing in his head, and he was so distracted he forgot his poker face and almost got caught.

Kaito can’t help but think, ‘Why me?’

Now both of them are chasing him, and he’s running like he’s got the hounds of hell on his heels. Maybe he does between the little demon girl and the scarily smart detective boy.

…Fields was right. If he gets out of this, he is never working with children ever again. Bad bad idea, Kaito, phenomenally bad, extraordinarily bad, terrible, horrible idea.

They corner him next to a cliff back, and he’s still in his riot gear. He doesn’t see an escape route, and if it were happening to anyone else, he’d find it funny.

Yeah, not so funny when it’s happening to him. These two children are _frightening_.

“Looks like we cornered him, Haibara.” the detective says.

“Seems to be that way, Edogawa-kun.” Haibara says. “Do you want to ask? Or should I?”

Wait, what?

“I’ll do it,” Edogawa says with a sigh. “It seems to me that the three of us find ourselves unexpectedly connected.”

“Not by choice, I assure you,” Kaito says.

Edogawa’s eyes light up. “So it is you! I wasn’t sure, but thank you for the confirmation.”

Kaito winces internally.

“And you owe me,” Haibara says. “Do you know how hard it is to calculate complex chemical equations while someone else is constantly singing in your head?”

Kaito stares. “You’re six.”

“Oh, you poor sweet innocent Kid,” Haibara says. “How little you know.” The two of them look at one another.

“Should we tell him?” Edogawa asks.

Haibara sweeps her hand out to the side. “Be my guest. Soulmate doesn’t necessarily mean trustworthy, however.”

“Well, we could turn him in right here. See how he does in police custody.”

Kaito tenses, eying his dart watch. “You could try.” Because as much as he wants to solve this little mystery, not at the expense of his freedom.

“We’ll let you go, but first I think we should settle a few things.”

“I could escape on my own,” Kid says.

“Uh huh,” Haibara says, looking at her fingernails, buffing them with a board Kaito didn’t see her pull out.

“So you put down the flashbang in your hand.” Kaito curses internally. “I’ll put down my watch, and we’ll have a discussion,” Edogawa says.

“All right. But you better keep your word.”

“Prepare to get schooled, Kid.” Haibara says. “And also? You have a terrible taste in music.”

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> Songs: Hamasaki Ayumi, _poker face_ | Queen, _It’s a Hard Life_ | Two-Mix, _Just Communication_ | _The Flea Waltz_ , or _I Stepped on the Cat_ | Magic Kaito 1412 OST, _Uhh KID_ | Amuro Namie, _Can You Celebrate_?


End file.
